Cata PVP

[Mosg2]

http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=163355

I've been casually watching Cata pvp videos and this one caught my eye. I think the devs were really successful in slowing down the pace of pvp and making it much more about thinking that globaling people. Of note are:

The shadow priests ends up using like 1/3 of his mana bar to heal about 1/3 of his health give or take. If it's the same across non-healing specs for classes that can't heal...

The rogue is never able to just KS and then blow someone up. I like it.

I think this direction is going to make boxing even better. You're still going to be able to kill someone in 2-3 seconds but healers just won't be able to heal through it. I like it.

[Boylston]

Yeah, I think coordinated fire is going to be more critical, not less. Big benefit for us.

I'm also hopeful that healing with 4-5 hybrid classes in DPS mode will still give us some survivability vs. a 1-3 character enemy force.

I guess we'll see.

Mosg2, what's your feeling-of-the-week? Shamans first, or druids?

[Mosg2]

Haha Boylston, I'm definitely still sold on the Shaman. Not being able to cast while in Boomkin form is just so damn limiting for the Druids. The Druids have tons of tools and good damage but in the end it's a pretty simple equation for me: They can't heal effectively while in the middle of combat and they don't have an insta-cast nuke that is likely to global a single target regardless of class/spec.

Shaman have both plus a lot of toys of their own.

[outdrsyguy1]

I agree, i love shaman right now. Between the crit and overload you can pop out about 33k no problem on a single lavaburst on one shaman. I think I could still global someone with a shaman, IF you set it up right.

Just so you guys know, you can't really hybrid spec anymore, you have to put 31 points in ONE tree BEFORE you can put a single point in any other tree. The healing spells when you are not a healer are pretty weaksauce. The greater healing wave heals for about 10 to 15% of your health now and lesser healing wave is about 5% of your health. Chain heal is god awful now but aoe got nerfed to hell so it shouldn't be as necessary or OP.

[Void]

still if i pick the shaman being focused and chain cast lesser healing waves into him 20% per cast till my healer can catch up wont be bad

[Boylston]

Yeah, I'm still sold on Shaman as well. The only thing I don't have figured out is my second profession on them. They are all Enchanting/empty, except for my main who has Inscription. I really dislike leveling Engineering, and I don't really think I'm going to arena much, so I may pick something else.

Re: healing capability-- I know non-resto healing won't be great, but we DO have the option of getting the two low-tier Resto talents to boost heals + healing received. That should help a little bit. I also hope that 3-4 heals going off on a character will help keep the team in the game. Very curious about how well stacked Healing Rains will work, as well.

I'm pleasantly surprised that we haven't seen many Shaman patch updates lately. I'm hoping that means that our damage ranges are close to the final values (either that or we're in store for a gigantic overhaul right before launch!).

Fulmination is likely going to remain strong for us. I see devs comments and think that they're OK with a shaman unloading a whopper of an attack if they're left alone to build up lightning shield charges. It will be balanced around single player shaman, I hope. I can see that this mechanic helps us immensely-- if you want to keep our entire team from building up charges, then you need to eat a LOT of lightning shield procs as you AoE down the shields. If you only focus on one, then you're likely to eat a 3-shaman burst of Fulmination at some point. In BG situations, I think it's going to be relatively easy for us to rack up shield charges and then be able to very quickly burst down a threatening target.

Can't come soon enough!